Transition

I really dislike this time of year. Summer is coming to an end. The weather is getting colder and the days are getting shorter. I'm OK with winter when it arrives, though I always look forward to it ending. Autumn is fine too. It's the end of summer that depresses the hell out of me. I'm definitely a summer person. I should reture to a warmer climate.

The little guy likes his new high-chair, but I think he has a cold. I was going to take a picture of him in the chair, but it's just too late now, so that will have to wait for tomorrow. We have an absolutely revolting device for sucking snot from his nose, which I used this morning before leaving for work. The dragon was just too scared.



That bulbous thing gets stuffed up his nose while the operator (me) sucks on the pipe. He actually doesn't seem to mind. While sucking on the pipe there is of course the nagging feeling that the only possible outcome is a mouthful of phlegm. Intellectually I know this is not a going to happen. Some survival instinct deep within the genetic makeup however attempts to persuade me otherwise.

Primal fear aside, I can report that this foul instrument is in fact quite effective.

There is a woman in my office that always seems to wear the exact same skirt and shirt. I only realised today that in three weeks, she has never looked different. This bothers me. Is she one of those serious academics that deosn't want to be bothered with choosing clothes and buys 15 sets of the same things so she doesn't have to worry about it? Is she really poor and can only afford one set of clothes? Or is she just dirty and doesn't care? I don't think she's poor or dirty.

OK, it's so late on Thrusday that it almost feels like Friday, and Friday is good because the next day is the weekend. So I'm going to leave it here for today and go to bed.

Moby Dick

My book list is growing. I need to read Moby Dick. I was told this morning that Moby Dick is about a man fighting the thought that perhaps God does not exist. I had no interest in the book until I learnt that.

I've found a particularly cool website that you should all look at. It's not suitable for work, it involves nudity, which has figured quite prominantly here recently, but it's tasteful. Click.

Clever innit? Did you try clicking on them?

I've mentioned before here about Liz Longhurst who has been campaigning to make "violent porn" illegal in Britain. It looks like she has won her battle and the government is planning to make possession of violent porn illegal and punishable with a three year prison sentence.

Longhurst is on this crusade because her daughter died during kinky sex with her boyfriend who was into the bondage porn thing. The Longhurst argument goes something like, "he was into violent porn, so it must have caused my daughter's death". That argument is about as strong as, "I saw a man with a green hat driving a Chrysler, so people who wear green hats all like Chryslers". How the hell does one define "violent porn" anyway? Click.

I'm amused by the fact that environmentalists are protesting at a coal fired power station in West Yorkshire. Apparently a camp sight has been set up and 500 people are there protesting against CO2 emissions. The BBC report makes the point that protestors are being searched, but they've missed the glaring irony. 30 years ago these people's parents were protesting against nuclear power at Greenham common and various other places. The reason we have coal fired power stations now is largely down to the environmentalists then. Why should we take any notice of them this time?

And that will do for now. I'm quite sure I will have to get up inthe night as the little guy has been difficult about feeds today. He hasn't had a poo either, which is disturbing. His new high chair arrived today, and Daddy had fun building it.

Inspirational

I took the train to work and arrived around 8.40 this morning. That's not bad; I left home about 7.45. There was a woman on the train who put all her bags on the seat next to her so nobody could sit there. I hate people like that. She was pretending to be asleep, but a man got on and poked her until she was forced to pretend to wake up and let him sit down. It made my day. I've never been brave enough to do that, but it was an inspirational display. I may try it next time I see an opportunity.

There seems to be a story in the news today about a Hong Kong tabloid that has published pictures of Hong Kong pop star Gillian Chung, half naked, without her permission. The pictures apparently appear to have been taken with a hidden camera while she was changing back stage at a concert.

This reminds me of a scandal that unfolded in Taiwan 2 or 3 years ago when a sleazy tabloid there published hardcore pictures (and movie) of a politician Chu Mei Fong, with her married boyfriend. What amazes me about these cases is not so much the fact that anyone would be grubby enough to plant these cameras and then sellt he footage, it's that anyone is stupid enough. In the case of the Taiwan scandal mentioned above, the magazine was removed from shelves within hours of release and just about everyone involved ended up in jail within the next month. I don't know what's going to happen with this Hong Kong mag, but you can bet there will be casualties, such is the public outcry.

No one can possibly win here, any boost to circulation will be offset with fines and penalties. Selling the footage will land you in jail. Publishing the pictures will land you in jail. What can possibly be gained?

Universal is planning to provide free downloadable music on the internet. They are intending to make money by advertising on the site. Now this is the music industry getting back in touch with its market place. About time too, you twerps. You should have started that 5 years ago. Click.

Bank Holiday

Bank holiday Monday, and no chance of a lie in of course. We were up at 7, thanks to the baby. Actually I don't mind. I wake up early anyway.

We decided against going to the White Horse Show because it cost £7.50 to get in. Where does all the money go? It's just a bunch of people in a field. The Bristol Balloon Fiasco was free. We did visit Bowood House on Saturday which was quite fun. There are extensive grounds and gardens, and half the house is open to the public.

Today we finally got around to buying a high-chair. The one we wanted was £49.95, but the one we chose had last season's cushion design, so it was only £39.95. They didn't have any in stock, but it gets delivered on Friday I understand.

I bought my season ticket for the train this morning. I'm going to give it a try this week. It took two trips to get a ticket because I didn't realise I needed to bring a passport photo. I'm thinking the ticket is really easy to forge and I might have a go at it. I don't want to dodge fairs, just want to see if I can get a fake one past the guard.

Mother had her operation this week to correct a jaw problem. Apparently it went well, but according to Father she's still in some pain. So we wish her well. I'm going to call her again tomrrow to see how she is.

We tried feeding the little guy mashed carrot today and he hated it. I thought all babies loved carrot. He screamed, spat it out, threw up, and generally demonstrated his dislike of carrots very effectively.

There seems to be a bit of a fuss going on now about micro chip rubbish bins. I can't get to the bottom of this really, but it seems as though local authorities are monitoring waste disposal by putting chips in some bins. Honestly, the amount of monry this country wastes on crap, it's no wonder we have the fastest rising taxes of any industrial country in the world.

Good day

I got paid today. Not only that, this is going to be a long weekend because Monday is a bank holiday. That'll be the first time in years I've been paid for a national holiday. It feels good. I want to buy a new matress. I also want to buy a new radio for the car. The existing one is very dead.

I got to work today at 9.10. That's late for me and it was because I forgot to update my iPOD the previous evening. I didn't want to drive to work sans radio, sans iPOD. One or the other would have been OK, but both out of action would represent a very bad start to the day.

I mentioned before that Herbert is starting to eat solids now, but I seldom get to see it these days because he only has his baby rice at lunchtime when I am at work. Today however he seemed hungry after milk at 8pm, so I gave him some more rice. He can grab the spoon and put it in his own mouth. I knew he was smart.

Tomorrow we are planning a visit somewhere, but I don't know where exactly. I was thinking we could go to Longleat, but that's quite a long way. Eugenie wants to see a British Stately home. I guess Longleat qualifies, but it has turned into more of a theme park in recent years. My parents used to live very near Longleat.

There seems to be a row going on at the moment about whether Pluto should be a planet. I can't say I really care very much. Haven't scientist got more important things to worry about? I heard of another study today informing us that Spring is definitely coming earlier each year. It's clearly supopsed to be another "proof" of global warming. I have a problem with this, mostly because the onset of Spring has got nothing to do with temperature really. It's to do with the tilt of the earth bringing the northern or southern hemisphere closer to the sun. This can be shown to be happening now exactly the same as it always has. The tilt of the earth hasn't changed.

It's late and I'm tired. I'm aware that I have not been writing anything of any great interest here lately. This is mostly due to the fact that I don't have much time right now. I will start up again at some point, but right now, other things take priority. I'm off to bed.

Evil I tell you, Evil

Yahoo toolbar is evil. I've spent half the morning trying to work out why my popups are being blocked and turning off every available piece of security I can, only to find bloody Yahoo tool bar merrily blocking them, even though I shut it down. I didn't even ask it to be there. I uninstalled it now anyway.

I did however find an application today that is so cool it actually forced the Yahoo toolbar experience from my mind. People who use Framemaker will know that it's very touchy about mouse scroll wheels. I found that Freewheel solves this problem. This will not impress most people, since most people don't use Framemaker, it has however improved my life. I can't think why I haven't come across this before since it has been around since 1999 apparently. That's 7 damn years.

I came home from work early today to go to the dentist. I've had a cavity filled in a wisdom tooth. It didn't hurt, but I have spent hours today with a numb face. I haven't seen a dentist in years, so I guess I was lucky it was just one filling. I have dental cover now, so I will keep having the check ups. My next appointment is in March 2007.

Tom Cruise has been cast adrift by Paramount because he is a nutter. Tom says it was his decision, Paramount says it was theirs. I suppose he doesn't have to make any more money for the rest of his life anyway.

I have resolved to stop driving and start using the train from next week. I have discovered that I can buy a weekly ticket for only slightly more than my weekly petrol costs. I'll let you all know how that goes.

We have a bank holiday coming up on Monday and I want to use it to do something cool. Friend Eugenie is here with us again now, so I said I'll drive us to somewhere nice on Saturday also. Currently Longleat is looking possible.

GCSE results are out today and amazingly they have improved for the 200th year in a row. Officially they now pass 97.9% of all who take the exams. How on earth can that be justified?

Nothing else noteworthy has hapened today.

Public?

Funny that someone should mention after my last entry, that they could never take their clothes off in public. I say this because I wasn't really expecting to take mine off. I thought it was a possibility, but I was certian that the venue would be crawling with clothed people sniggering at a few hardcore naturists out to make a point. In fact, being one of the few clothed people was far stranger than being one of the multitude of naked revellers. I was quite sure the Dragon wouldn't be disrobing, but I was wrong. It may not be for everyone, but it was a good day.

I suppose one could argue that it wasn't really public. People had to buy a ticket to enter. Everyone was warned of course that there would be a naked people within. Those people for whom naturism just wasn't an option simply walked away. I heard one middle aged woman mumbling about not wanting to see "dangling bits" as she turned back. The only time it became public was when we staryed onto those few areas of the garden that could be seen from the outside. There was really only one place. As we walked back to the car I saw one woman do a comical double take as she glanced through a hole in the hedge.

I managed to forget my lunch today. I left it in the fridge. It was OK, I had a sandwhich from the shop instead. I hate when I do stupid stuff like that. The dargon found it in the fridge at home and ate it for me. I think I'm going to start using the train from next week. Actually, next Monday is a bank holiday, yeah, three-day weekend!

Very little exciting is happening in the news today. I notice that 11 of those arrested as part of the alleged terrorist plot to blow up aircraft have been charged and are to appear in court. I'm still not sure this is going anywhere. I haven't yet heard of any evidence that supports the theory that they were actually planning anything. I may be wrong.

It's late, I'm tired, more tomorrow.

Just dropped by

I expect you're wondering whether we went to the clothes optional day at Abbey House Gardens. well we did and we had such a great time. I didn't have very high hopes for the weather, and I'd almost shelved the idea by Saturday. But we had to drive past anyway on our way to Devon, so we decided to look in. As it happens the weather turned out nice. I thought it would be just a couple of hard-core naturists and hundreds of clothed people sniggering at them. Actually though, it was more like the other way round.

There were hundreds of nudists, and about half a dozen clothed people. There wasn't any sniggering. It was a very strange atmosphere indeed. I actually felt out of place wearing clothes. So I took them off. We didn't realise it when we went there, but they had a system in place in the tea shop whereby those wishing to disrobe could place their clothes in a numbered plastic bag and leave them there to pick up later. We should have done that. We had a bag for baby things however, so that was utilised as a clothes holder.

I've never done the naturist thing before, but I'd actually recommend it. They were all so friendly. Actually, I discovered through the people there that there is a nude swimming session every Saturday at the local pool. Great way to get the little guy into swimming I'm thinking.



We spent the rest of the weekend in Devon with the parents. Their ruby wedding went off quietly. They were pleased to see us, and even my brother showed up.

I've been in London for work today. I read the time table wrong this morning and just missed the train I wanted. The next one was delayed so I was late. Coming back, the train I wanted was cancelled. I took the next available one, but when I got on board, the notice said that it didn't stop at my station. So I got off again. The departure board outside said that it was making an extra stop at my station. So I got back on again. Then the train moved off and all the stations were announced over the speaker system. My station wasn't announced. So I asked the ticket collector if the train stopped at my station. He gave one of those huge shrugs that leaves one in no doubt that he'd really rather be doing anything than answering this question. "No one has told me anything about it", he told me, and moved away.

I resolved to get off the damn train at the earliest opportunity and switch to one that I knew was going where I wanted. I found that other people had also made this decision and I accosted a railway worker chap on the platform to ask him if he knew where the train was stopping. He didn't know either, but he went to ask the driver, and came back to tell me that it definitely was going to stop at my station. So I got on a thrid time. I wasn't 100% sure about the info, but it turned out to be right in the end.

Dawn of a New Era

So tomorrow is clothes optional day at the Abbey House Gardens. We were thinking of going, but it looks like the weather is going to mean that nudity is unlikely, in which case, might as well just walk around naked at home for a couple of hours.

We're actually going to Ddevon for the weekend in celebration of the parents' 40th wedding anniversary. I've been trying to get hold of my brother to ask him to pick up a gift from friend Eugenie on the way, but he's strangely in unreachable now. I'm looking forward to the weekend anyway.

The boy got weighed today and has made it to 6.4kg. That's up 300g from two weeks ago. He's also grwon 2cm taller since we last measured him, but I can't remember how long ago that was. He's looking forward to seeing Grandma and Grandpa too.

Today marks the end of my first week at work since mid July. The strain is probably showing. I'm feeling pretty worn out, but it's good to be earning. They provide free coffee at my office, which might not be such a good thing. I'm caffine wired. On Monday I have to go to the London office for the day.

I started listening to the Escape Pod SF story today and my battery died about two minutes into it. How unlucky is that? I recommend this pod cast to anyone interested in short fiction. They've just launched a more adult horror fiction pod cast that I intend to investigate next week.

In other news, the chiming clock in our dining room has stopped and doesn't seem to want to go again. I actually bought it for an old girlfriend years ago. She never liked it (she never had any taste) and it consequently has bad memories for me. So I'm treating this as a good sign in disguise. I know my father has another chiming clock that he wanted to give us. He has hundreds of the damn things. So I'm going to tray and bring it back this weekend and start a new era in this house.

OK, tune in Monday and I'll tell you whether we went to the naturist day at the Abbey House Gardens.

Excuses

I was watching a tv programme last night about a fat woman who was a spendaholic. She was £27,000 in debt on various credit cards and had a £14,000 a year job as an office manager. The idea of the show was to send in a psychologist and a "lifestyle guru" to sort her out. Why do people subject themselves to this kind of humiliation?

The lifestyle guru was your standard low intelligence hippie woman spouting a combination of utter cobblers and the bleeding obvious. This is to be expected, all "lifestyle gurus" are the same in my experience. I had higher hopes for the psychologist.

The psychologist started by digging deep into the subjects childhood. No surprises there. He found out about all sorts of problems she had as a child and came to the conclusion that her addiction to shopping was down to depression and guilt.

Now I'm no psychologist (although I do have an A level) but here's what occurred to me. If you have someone doing something stupid that is threatening to ruin the rest of their life, you need to get them to see that they have to take responsibility for their actions. Does that sound hard? I watched this psychologist giving his patient ready-made excuses for her behaviour and came to the conclusion that it was precisely the wrong thing to do. Just thought I'd run that by you guys.

Talking of A levels, results are out today and they are up for the 24th, yes 24th year in a row. Now just under 25% of students are getting the top grade. That's an attendance certificate, not a qualification. The authorities are threatening to add a new top grade above the existing A-grade, called A*. The more cynical amongst us are wondering if that's just so that next year the grades can't be meaningfully compared with this year's and the annual argument about standards slipping will be avoided.

Last night I elected to record Dr Who instead of trying to watch it while feeding the boy. There are two reasons for this; firstly, I can never hear or watch the tv while my son is struggling with his bottle, and secondly, he always appears to be more difficult to feed while the Dr Who is on. The up shot was that I recorded 45 minutes of static and missed the war with the daleks completely. What a knob!

Penn Jillette says the way to deal with those Christians who knock on your door and ask you to talk about Jesus is to answer the door stark naked and invite them in. He says you get put on some kind of black list after that and you never hear from them again. I thinK the idea has possibilities.

I've attempted to speak to someone at the job centre every day sonce Monday to inform them that I am now working again. So far I have been treated to endless busy tones, a "number unreachable" message, a bimbo on the switchboard who can't help me at all, and about 30 mimutes of Vivaldi in a continuous loop. I have not however been able to inform them that I'm working. I have discovered that "they don't do e-mail" and that I can write to them in Cornwall by snail mail. Wouldn't it be ironic if I had to take a day off work to inform the job centre that I'm working again!

17 minutes

I did start to write an entry for yesterday, but it never got finished. I'm not confident enough at work to start writing diary entries on notepad in the background as I work. It seems funny to be working again. I took about a month off in the end and actually getting back intt the saddle was a shock to the system. I feel good about it all however. I think I'd go mad if I didn't have a reason to get up in the morning for too long.

I was thinking today that mordern offices demand a lot from people. It's taken for granted that you know how to operate a PC and all the regular MS Office packages. I have to use Lotus notes in my office and I'm in the dark about that. I haven't come across anything that genuinely scares me yet however. The financial side of things is alien territory for me. Though I have worked in the banking world before, I've never really had to understand anything about trading or risk. I've impressed myself with how much I've learnt in the last few days.

It takes me about 40 minutes to drive to work. That's fine, I can use that time to listen to Escape pod, Penn Jillette on Free FM, and the Telegraph pod cast, amongst other things. I don't much like driving however, and I was hoping I could use the train. I discovered that the train journey is just 17 minutes. I can walk to the station from home, and it's an 8 minute bus ride at the other end. Thanks to Tony Blair however, it's £25 a day. I can drive, even with UK petrol prices, for about £8. How do these people sleep at night?

This weekend will be our 2nd weddding anniversary. We're going down to Devon because we share our own anniversary with my parents who are celebrating 40 years together this year. I'm quite looking forward to it. Even little brother has said he will make it down there, so we'll all be together for the first time since Christmas. Unfortunately this all clashes with clothing optioanl day at Malmsbury Abbey House Gardens, which I really did want to attend. But it is on the way. If the weather is nice, we could pop in on the way. It's not worth doing if it's cold or raining, and this week hasn't been good so far.

And the only news item of even the remotest interest to me today is this: A new anonymous "darknet" file sharing service has been launched in Sweden, and the interest is such that the service has already fallen down due to demand. Soon there will be hundreds of file sharing networks like this and then what will the recording industry do? You guys should have listened to your customers when you had the chance shouldn't you? The service is called "Relakks", and when it gets back on it's feet again, you can find it here.

Hi Ho!

Well I started the new job today. The first few days are always nasty, but I got on OK and everyone was nice to me. It'll take a while to settle in, but on balance, it's good to be working again. It takes me about 40 minutes to drive there, but I was talking to the receptionist today and she says there is a free shuttle bus service to the train station, so I'm going to be investigating the possibility of a train commute.

In other news, I heard this morning that a BA plane was turned back because a mobile phone was found during the flight. Apparently it started to ring and no one wanted to admit to owning it, so the flight turned back. I bet that was a plane full of annoyed passengers.Click

I've also heard lots of stories about flights taking off empty because passengers couldn't get through the security checks fast enough. It's getting silly. I'm still waiting for the news that it was all a cock-up and all the arrested suspects have been released.

The media aren't helping. A so called security expert on the BBC yesterday was talking about aviation targets being an Al Qaeda trademark. It's funny, but apart from 9/11, I don't actually remember another Al Qaeda incident involving planes. They blew up embassies, they trained guerillas, but I can't remember any aviation action before or since. And today the Home office appears very pleased with itself after finding two guns. I can't quite see how two guns can possibly be connected with a plot to blow up planes with liquid explosives, but there you are.

I haven't had much chance to look at papers of news today, so that's all for now.

I'm not keen on balloons

You will know, if you read yesterday's entry, that I had kite flying on White Horse Hill penciled in for today. There is an irony in this that will become clear later.

Kite flying did not take place today because I told the dragon that the annual Bristol balloon festival was to take place this weekend, and she wanted to see it. I don't much like the balloon festival because every year the balloons seem to reamin stuburnly grounded due to wind or rain. The organisers historically tend to release optimistic announcements throughout the day, but the weather always seems to keep the balloons from launching in the end. It frustrates me.

I agreed to postpone kite flying to go to the balloon festival anyway. There are always other things to do there and it's never a complete wash-out. So we went. It really wasn't a bad day. We saw camels, went to the French market, ate good food, saw parachuters land, and an aerobatic display. As usual however, the baloons reamined on the ground.

There were hundreds of them laid out in the arena at 6pm. One or two were even inflated, but remained tethered. The the announcement came. Wind was up over nine knots and they were going to wait an hour for the wind to die down. Nine knots is like slow walking pace and even I thought this was over cautious. Then 7pm came and a second announcment went out. The wind was still too strong and they were going to have another go at 7.45. By this time I knew it wasn't going to happen. I could see the balloons being folded up and packed away in the arena.

The dragon however remained hopeful that something would take off, so we waited. Then the 7.45 announcement came, as it always does, confirming that we were wasting our time. And at that point 15,000 people all rushed to their cars as one and attempted to leave through the single exit gate.

I'm not grumbling. It wasn't a bad day at all, and let's face it, I knew it was going to happen. I don't even let the optimistic announcements lull me into some false hope of a launch any more. The irony that I mentioned at the top of this post, in case you missed it, was the fact that I cancelled a kite flying day, to go to see a balloon launch that was cancelled due to wind.

Naturism and the 9-5 grind

I got the start date for the new job today. Form Monday I have to put on a tie and go to an office for the first time in over a month. I'm looking forward to it, but I can't pretend that it isn't going to be an effort. The first week I work in Oxford, then I have a day in london as an induction. All terribly exciting.

This all means that I only have a couple of days left to enjoy before I get back into the 9-5 grind. I'm going to try and make the most of it. Today the dragon and I took the little guy to Malmesbury. It's a very old town, only about 25 miles from here, with a ruined Abbey...



and some nice gardens...



It may sound boring, but we had a great day. We packed a picnic lunch and spent hours in the gardens.

The gardens are tended by some naturist gardeners. Generally they work clothed, but occasionally they have a clothes optional day it seems. It was not a clothes optional day today, though the two gardeners we saw were wearing only swimming costumes.





It was a great day anyway. Even the car park ticket machine went wrong. It took 50p and and gave me back £1.50. I gave it to the Abbey colelction box when we went to visit.

The next clothing optional day is apparently 18 Aug. The dragon wants to go and see if anyone actually shows up naked. I was thinking I might like to go too. I was thinking I could get the dragon to take some pictures of me covorting naked through the undergrowth and publish them here.

In case anyone else is interested, here is the website.

Since I have been without work for the last few weeks I took the opportunity to visit the dentist for the the first time in about ten years this week. Apparently one of my wisdom teeth requires filling. I suppose I can't complain about one filling in ten years. I have made an appointment on 24 Aug.

Friend Eugenie from Taiwan (currently studying in Wales) is here for the weekend. This is good, we like her and it gives the dragon a chance to chat in Chinese.

I can't let this entry go by without mentioning today's airport disruption. I am torn between having a rant about the senseless pricks who try and blow up aircraft, and merely specualating that in a few hours we are likely to hear that all the 18 people arrested toady will have been released without charge and will be suing the Met Police force.

I'm in a good mood, so I'm not going to give the Met a rough ride. Let's wait and see what happens. I stillt hink people that blow up aircraft are pricks. I wouldn't mind so much if I understood what they actually wanted to achieve. But that's the 21st century for you.

Tomorrow we have kite flying scheduled for White Horse Hill. If there's enough wind I'm going to get out the 2m Flexifoil. Look for pictures of me being dragged over Britain's oldest chalk monument tomorrow.

Oxford

On Saturday we took a trip to Oxford. My new office is close to Oxford and it's a lovely city. So we might, at some time in the future, relocate there. The dragon likes it because there are traditional shops. In particular there are excellent butchers.

The little chap likes it also apparently...



I don't really intend to mention my new office on these pages. It hasn't been mentioned specifically, but quite a few employers object to blogs, and I have no wish to bite the hand that is about to feed me. I'm going to mention it today however.

I received my confirmation letter on Saturday morning. It confirmed my offer of employment, subject to satisfactory references and proof of right to work in the UK. The letter did not explain what type of references were required of where to send them. Neither did it explain what constitutes proof of right to work in the UK. Enclosed was also a copy of my contract to sign, two appication forms to complete, and details of how to complete the on-line screening process. I've signed the contract already, but they didn't tell me where to send it, so it remains on the dining room table. I have also completed the on-line screening process, though it was supposed to be completed no later than 4 Aug according to the letter, and I received in on 5 Aug.

We went up to White Horse Hill on the way home from Oxford. Not only is this one of the oldest chalk monuments in the world, about 3,000 years, it's also excellent kite flying country. So we spent an enjoyable hour or two flying a couple of kites. The little guy enjoyed this. He has recently discovered the joy of riding in the sling. He has expereinced the sling before, but up to now he has only been allowed to face towards Mummy or Daddy. On White Horse Hill he faced forwards, which is aparently much more fun, especially when kite flying.

The really big news this week however, is that he's started eating solid food. He's had baby rice and some pureed apple. I think he liked the apple, but the jury is still out on the baby rice. He's still drinking formula milk, and he seems to fart more/ Other than that, all seems normal.

Interview tip

Well I got a job offer today, and it's a good salary, an interesting position, not too far from home, so I don't have to relocate. It felt like everything just fell into place this morning.

I had the interview on Wednesday, they liked me and asked me back yesterday, and today they made an offer. I think the interview yesterday was the clincher. As I was waiting for the interview to begin, I noticed that one of my socks was on inside out. I'm anal about that type of thing and I desperately wanted to changed it, but there was no time, so I had to go through the entire second interview with one sock on inside out. I think it swung it for me.

The agency called me this morning and asked me how it went. I thought it was just a follow up call, but after I started telling them how it went he told me they'd made an offer. It came out of nowhere because I wasn't expecting it until Monday or Tuesday.

So today the pressure lifted. I feel like a better husband and father, and all is right with the world. Actually, saying that could be tempting fate. I haven't got the confirming letter yet. It could still go tits up.

In other news, I had my interview at the benefit office today and I still don't know if I can claim anything for being out of work. I think I can, but they now need the dragon's passport for some reason. They have also scheduled my next meeting to clash with a dentist appointment. I've been trying all day to reschedule it, but they just put me on hold. I went back to the office to try and see someone, but they appeared unable to help either. Gimps. I'll try again Monday.

The little guy had his weekly weigh-in and came it at over 6kg for the first time.

We were going to go to White Horse Hill this afternoon but it rained and we aborted the mission. Tomorrow we are planning an excursion to Oxford. The new job is near Oxford and the long term plan may be to relocate. We shall see.

And on that note I will leave you for today.

Grunge

Well tomorrow is another interview. I don't know much about the job, but it's close, and it pays well. These are good starting points as far as I'm concerned.

Not very much of note has happened since I last wrote. Friend Dave and fa,ily showed up on Sunday and we had some fun together. The kids think I'm mad and it turns out that they're not over keen on Chinese food. The parents however loved it. They came armed with sacks of clothes and toys from the first year of their son's life.

Our little chap is still acting strangely about food. I still think he wants to eat solids. He's waking up frequently now and crying for no apparent reason. Yesterday he finished nearly 900 ml of formula, which is a lot. Today I finshed building his activity cage. The paint is drying as we speak. I'll maybe post a picture tomorrow.

Yesterday was in fact Chinese Valentines day. I never know when this is going to happen because it is calculated using the luna calendar and it's not the same day each year in the ordinary calendar. We did celebrate the occasion with a trip to the beautiful city of Bath anyway. We visted the Jane Austin Centre. I'm not a fan of Jane Austin, but the museum is worth a visit and the dragon had a whale of a time.

I'm always amazed by the inhabitants of Bath. It's an affluent area of the country, but a huge number of clearly wealthy locals seem to make a huge effort to look poor. The grungy distressed look appears particularly popular with young women between about 16 and 30. Frayed denim is ubiquitous, as is baggy knitwear and designer dreadlocks. Dreadlocks on black people don't look grungy, but on middle-class, white females, somehow they do.

I've come to the conclusion that this ironic middle class obsession with looking poor, must stem from some misplaced guilt at being wealthy. Or it could just be that I'm talking rubbish. It wouldn't be the first time.